Learning activities, educational games, and tangibles: Arabic language learning in the ALADDIN project

The paper presents ongoing work on the ALADDIN project, a 3-year endeavor that involves the re-conceptualization of the standard Arabic language learning curriculum for kindergarten students in Qatar, supported by a comprehensive technology-enhanced learning framework. The curriculum, scheduled for September '13, follows an adapted version of the traditional folk Aladdin story, divided into 22 episodes, presented over a 45-lesson series (9 weeks). During the second half of each lesson, instruction is based on educational technology. The learning goals of letter recognition and production are served through storyboarding, learning activities, and educational games, specifically designed for tabletop computers and situated in the contextual theme created by the story. The unique affordances of the underlying technology provide a highly collaborative and interactive environment, while the ability of tabletops to recognize tangibles via tags creates a more vivid experience for the students. The paper discusses: (a) the specific context of this work and the instructional goals, (b) the theoretical foundations of the new curriculum, (c) the unique characteristics of the technology used and the design issues raised, (d) preliminary data gathered by observing young children using the technology, and (e) examples of learning activities and games designed for the project.